The First Cuts the Shallowest
by TheChicaChic
Summary: One-Shot set series 9 AU. She'd only had seconds to take in the van before the three men had jumped from the open back door and hustled her into it. It had been black with Jameson Plumbing stenciled on the side, the windows on the side door and back blackened with a privacy screen.


**_AN: This story has been nagging at me all week, begging to be shared. I've worked with it, toning down the darkness and negativity, and hopefully you'll find that it still works this way. Set in series 9, this takes place after Harry proposes in my mind._**

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_One_.

She'd only had seconds to take in the van before the three men had jumped from the open back door and hustled her into it. It had been black with _Jameson Plumbing_ stenciled on the side, the windows on the side door and back blackened with a privacy screen.

It had been quick, one moment she was standing on the corner down the street from her flat, the next she had been struggling against the hold of one of those men; one thick muscled arm pinning her arms to her waist, the other holding a gloved hand over her mouth as a door slammed shut and the vehicle sped off. Throughout the entire drive across London on that cold, gray late-January morning, this man had held onto her, his grip squeezing the air from her every time she tried to struggle.

_Two_.

She'd been treated well those first few days, her captors doing nothing but tossing her into a brick cell in the basement of the building. It'd been cold, damp, and dark with the only light coming from the single, thin window along the ceiling of one wall, but a cheap wooden single had been set in the corner, covered with clean sheets and a thick duvet.

Across from it, a cheap table matching the wood of the bed had been set, two mismatched chairs pushed under it. On top, a battered best seller had sat, next to it a cheap book of paper and a pen, and an unopened bottle of water. An old cardigan had hung from one of the chairs, fabric patches at the elbows, and next to it, a well-worn pair of men's pajama pants, and a pair of thick socks.

Surprised but grateful, she had pulled on the clothes, neatly folding the long skirt she had put on for work only hours before.

_Three_.

She'd rarely seen the men who'd grabbed her. Early each morning, the door to her cell would open, the clang of metal on metal her only moment of warning that someone was coming in, two masked men standing there. One would hold an automatic rifle, his dark eyes dispassionately staring at her as the other would set down a cardboard bowl of warm cereal, his eyes never meeting hers.

Sometime later, the men would return, the one standing guard at the door while the other would mutter for her to follow him. Silently, they would lead her through the hallway, exposed bulbs dimly lighting the space every few yards, until they reached a small washroom at the end. There, they would leave her for ten minutes; no more, no less; to use the loo and wash up with the generic soap and toothpaste left sitting on the sink.

The snap of a lock on the outside of the wooden door that second morning had given her a sense of security and she had quickly bathed in the battered shower, the lukewarm water chilling her but still left her with a sense of being clean. She'd been quick that first morning, not sure if they would keep their word of the ten minutes or not, and fear had had her sitting on the closed lid of the loo waiting those last three minutes.

_Four._

That first week; those long seven days; each had been the same. The warm cereal for breakfast, ten minutes to use the toilet and get clean, to pull on worn but clean men's pajama pants and a loose thread-bare t-shirt and thick socks, before being led to a simple, temporary sitting room on the other side of the warehouse. There, another masked man had sat, looking out of place on the small sofa, legs crossed in the military fatigues, his gloved hands resting on his knee.

For an hour, he would speak with her, his voice clipped in an undistinguishable accent, asking her questions. About assignments; past and present; Section D was working on, seemingly unphased when she wouldn't or couldn't provide any information. About her life, speaking of things in her past, before rounding once again to present cases and watch lists. Exactly one hour after their conversation started, he would end it, rising from his position on the sofa and leaving the room.

_Five._

The two men would lead her back to the cell again, leaving her alone in the weak light of day. Fresh water bottles would be sitting on the table, and on the fourth day, three new books sat on the table. She'd have three hours to herself, to pace the ten by ten cell, to sit at the table and write her thoughts down in letters to Harry, to sit on the mattress, knees pulled to chest and read from a book.

At what she could only assume to be midday, the two men would return and lead her to the restroom, giving her five minutes to use the facilities before leading her once again to the sitting room. Here, she would be given her second meal; either a sandwich or a bowl of canned soup and an apple; before the third man would return. Again for exactly one answer, he would ask her questions, stopping as a small timer went off.

They would leave her in the room then, giving her 3 hours to watch mindless soap operas on the telly, something she would normally never watch, but given her current predicament, relished as some kind of contact. Even if it was with fictional characters.

_Six._

She would be led to the rest room again and given another five minutes before an evening meal mimicking the midday would be given to her. After, she would be questioned again, the same questions asked over and over, more pressure added to each. And each time, she would either be unable or unwilling to answer.

The evening sessions always lasted two hours.

After, she'd have her last visit to the rest room, given ten minutes like in the morning to freshen up, to do whatever it was that she needed, before being led back to her cell.

In the darkness, there was not much she could do. The weak, single beam of light coming through the window was not enough to read or write by, and so she was left with her thoughts. Of her life. Before the service, during her exile, in the service – of Harry.

_Seven._

Things changed on the seventh day.

The questions became more pointed, more fierce, and with a seemingly singular mission of learning the routines of those higher up in 5, in 6, and in White Hall.

The last minutes of that last daily session brought on the first act of violence against her; an open handed slap across the face in response to her silence.

_Eight._

The first thing to disappear from the cell was the books. After her ten minutes in the bathroom, she had been returned to her cell to find the books were gone.

The slaps at her silence began to happen with regularity.

_Nine._

The questioning began taking place in her cell, no more was she taken across the building to the sitting room. Now, she realized, she missed the warmth of the room and though temporary and shabby, the homeliness of it.

The slaps getting harder until the skin of her lip broke.

_Ten._

She returned from her morning venture to the washroom to find the bed gone. Now, only a thin mattress lay on the floor, a threadbare blanket tossed on top for warmth. Beside it, a metal bucket sat, and she wondered what they were going to do with it.

It became apparent when no one returned for the remainder of the day.

_Eleven_.

Her trips to the washroom stopped, the three meals became one of nothing more than bread and an apple, four bottles of water her only drink. Afternoons were now spent with questioning; the polite, almost gentle man replaced with a monster.

Slaps across the face became punches to the stomach, to the chest.

Prolonged silence led to being thrown into the wall or to the floor.

Crying out in pain led to even more pain; to a burn with a cigarette or a kick to the ribs.

She learned to whimper in silence, to keep the crying at bay until the darkness of night.

_Twelve._

At some point in the day, she felt her ribs break. Breathing became a painful, moving even more so, and the increasing painful responses to her repeated 'I don't knows' unbearable.

_Thirteen._

She was alone…

_Fourteen._

…and hungry…

_Fifteen._

…and thirty.

_Sixteen._

Three days of leaving her absolutely alone had done nothing to curtail the violence in their questioning, but instead, heightened it. Now, before even beginning the long hours of questions, of wanting to know security protocols and code names, came a beating.

Each question started with a slap, ended with a punch.

A standard answer from the brief training she had received as a desk spook brought on a kick or a burn.

A non-answer brought on some other form of torture.

_Seventeen._

She had been woken from a fitful sleep to being dragged across the floor, the scream of anguish, of pain, and fear escaping her lips before she can stop it. The beating is brutal, the pain blinding, and as her head smashes into the concrete floor, she sees stars.

Through the gasping for air, she hears the sound of a zip being undone.

For the first time, she wishes for death.

_Eighteen._

The facing staring at her is unrecognizable.

Her hair is knotted, is matted with dried blood.

Bruises cover her face, her neck, and the rest of her body.

It's the first time in seven days she has been out of that cell, has been able to tend to any of her numerous cuts and burns, to try and wash away…

She barely makes it to the loo before she's sick. There's very little aside from acid in her stomach and by the time she's done, her throat is burning. Weakly, she pulls herself off the floor and to the sink. Now, she avoids looking in the mirror.

She scoops water into her mouth with her hand, rinsing and spitting.

Rinsing and spitting.

Hands gripping the basin, she's unsure how much longer she has until they come for her. Left hand tightening, she shakingly raises the right and opens the glass cabinet above.

_Nineteen_.

She's not sure how much longer she can hold out before giving in to their demands. Twelve days is much longer than she had ever fleetingly imagined she could withstand any kind of this treatment, and as she cradles her left hand, with the five snapped fingers and broken hand, she knows the end is near.

With a grunt of pain, she pulls the book of paper into her lap and begins to write.

_Twenty._

The first cut burns.

It is nothing as she expected as she runs the thin straight-edged blade horizontally down her arm.

A prick, a pull of flesh, as the sharp metal just barely slices through the battered skin of her left forearm. The thin trickle of blood barely visible against the purple bruises as she stares at it.

Watches.

Waits.

It stops bleeding before long, just another trail of visible evidence to the trial she has undergone these past three weeks. It's not enough, she knows that deep down, but naively she had hoped it would be.

Raising the blade again, she takes a shallow breath, careful even now as death looms nearer to avoid the puncture of a rib into lung, and slashes harder, deeper, into the flesh of her arm.

Twenty times she cuts herself, one for each day she has spent in this hell, and as the warmth of her blood begins to trickle over skin, she lets the blade fall to the floor beside her.

Tears prick the corners of her eyes as she thinks of all the things she wishes she had done differently in her life.

Of chances she wishes she had taken.

Of relationships she wishes to have had the chance to repair.

Of what might have been.

Shifting now, she leans back against the wall and watches as the blood slowly flows from her arm, as it begins falling into her lap. Somewhere deep in her mind, she knows there are quicker ways; a quick, firm slash to the artery in her neck; but even deeper, she still holds onto the hope that just maybe they'll find her.

It's foolish she knows.

Her eyes drift shut, the pain radiating throughout her body overcome by a sense of peace, and the tears streaming down her face, intermixing with the growing pool of blood in her lap come now from regret and an emotional pain of never fixing things with Harry.

Somewhere, she can hear the chirping of birds, the scent of some flower filling the air, and she struggles to open her eyes. The light is blinding and as she blinks, she takes in the sunlight, feels its warmth against her cold, battered skin. She looks around, smiles at the warm voice speaking behind her as she takes in the rolling hills of the countryside.

"Ruth?"

* * *

**One Month Later**

It is the middle of a Wednesday afternoon as he stops at the top of the hill. Around him, the rolling hills of the Yorkshire Countryside are turning green, the first buds of blooming flowers springing up as the trees show signs of new life. Somewhere a bird chirps, and in the distance, he can hear the sounds of rushing water as the creek beats against rocks.

He breathes deeply as he raises a hand, shading his eyes as he looks down the hill to where a thick blanket is spread across the ground. A smile; one that has rarely left his face this past month; grows as he makes out the figure stretched out atop it, the large pile of cushions he had carefully arranged earlier in the day supporting her back and head.

"Ruth," he calls out, loud enough to let her know he is there. She doesn't move and he feels the small ball of apprehension in his stomach unknot as she hasn't woken in the time it had taken for him to walk back to the house for her jumper. Waking alone, he has come to find since they had arrived at his childhood home, causes her to become encompassed in a panic he can appreciate only too well, and so he has made sure to be as close she'll let him be.

Quietly, he makes his way the twenty feet down the hill to where she sleeps, stopping at the edge of the blanket to toe off his trainers, before gently lowering himself to the blanket beside her. Setting the jumper to the side, he just watches her a moment, his eyes taking in the yellowing tint to the fading bruises on her face, the lavender cast encompassing her left wrist and hand, white gauze protecting the rows of stitches covering her forearm, the puckered scars of burned skin above it, and thinks she has never looked quite so beautiful.

Shifting, he stretches his jean-clad legs out and turns to rest on his left side, his head supported by his hand as he watches the gentle rise and fall of her chest. For the three weeks she had been missing, he had feared they would never have this chance, the thoughts of what could be happening to her plaguing him, and only the knowledge that she needed him had kept him from immersing himself in the bottle of a Whiskey bottle.

Lightly, he reaches out with his right hand and brushes the back of a finger down the length of her cheek. She sighs and he freezes, worried for a moment that he has scared her, but that quickly changes as her eyes flutter open and she smiles up at him.

"Hi," she says softly, wincing in residual pain as she turns on her side to look at him.

"Hi," he says back, his hand moving to rest lightly on her hip, his fingers slowly tracing the pattern he has found that soothes her. "Did you have a good nap?"

"Hmm, yes." She sighs again, blue eyes watching his with a light that has been missing since her return from Cypress the year before. Shifting forward, she leans into him before speaking again. "I was dreaming of a spring afternoon in Paris."

"We can go," is his answer as he slowly lets his arm settle around her waist. Shifting them around, he moves until he is on his back, his head supported on the cushions as she curls into his side, her hand and cheek resting over the steady beat of his heart. He knows she finds comfort in this position, that the warmth and steady beat of his heart reassuring her that they are both, in fact, still alive, and though he had been worried at first that she would come to recoil from the touch, the exact opposite had happened. She had, instead, found a security in knowing he would have to be dead before anyone else would ever touch her without her consent. "We can go anywhere you want."

"You have to go back to work." The argument in her voice has weakened in the last two weeks, and she is resigning herself to the fact that chances are neither one of them will be returning to Thames House. She had known she would not be, the thought of going back to work somewhere that had already taken so much from her unacceptable, but never had she thought Harry would leave as well. Throughout his life, he had given up so much in his life to the service; the thought that he would willingly leave the place outside a body bag never crossed her mind.

"Perhaps a week in Paris followed by a week in Montpellier," he continues, ignoring her as he looks down at the top of her hair.

"Harry," she says, slowly lifting her head to meet his eyes. "We have to talk about this."

"There's nothing to talk about." His answer is firm as he moves to gently press his lips against her forehead. She's about to say something contrary to that when his hand drifts to brush against the back of her hair and continues. "At least not on that topic."

Knowing not to argue, she just nods her head and moves, turning until she lying on her back, his arm tightly wrapped around her shoulder as her head rests in the crevice of his neck. Quietly they watch the clouds drift through the sky, his finger tracing the alphabet against her shoulder as she relaxes, remembering a broken dream of a sunny afternoon picnic.

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**_AN: I hope that you enjoyed, and that if you've a moment, you'll leave a review. X Jenna_**


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